BORDER DISPUTE WITH VENEZUELA

When Britain gained formal control over what is now Guyana in 1814,
it also became involved in one of Latin America's most persistent border
disputes. At the London Convention of 1814, the Dutch surrendered the
United Colony of Demerara and Essequibo and Berbice to the British.
Although Spain still claimed the region, the Spanish did not contest the
treaty because they were preoccupied with their own colonies' struggles
for independence. In 1835 the British government asked German explorer
Robert Hermann Schomburgk to map British Guiana and mark its boundaries.
As ordered by the British authorities, Schomburgk began British Guiana's
western boundary with Venezuela at the mouth of the Orinoco River. A map
of the British colony was published in 1840. Venezuela protested,
claiming the entire area west of the Essequibo River. Negotiations
between Britain and Venezuela over the boundary began, but the two
nations could reach no compromise. In 1850 both agreed not to occupy the
disputed zone.

The discovery of gold in the contested area in the late 1850s
reignited the dispute. British settlers moved into the region and the
British Guiana Mining Company was formed to mine the deposits. Over the
years, Venezuela made repeated protests and proposed arbitration, but
the British government was uninterested. Venezuela finally broke
diplomatic relations with Britain in 1887 and appealed to the United
States for help. The British at first rebuffed the United States
government's suggestion of arbitration, but when President Grover
Cleveland threatened to intervene according to the Monroe Doctrine,
Britain agreed to let an international tribunal arbitrate the boundary
in 1897.

For two years, the tribunal consisting of two Britons, two Americans,
and a Russian studied the case. Their three-to-two decision, handed down
in 1899, awarded 94 percent of the disputed territory to British Guiana.
Venezuela received only the mouth of the Orinoco River and a short
stretch of the Atlantic coastline just to the east. Although Venezuela
was unhappy with the decision, a commission surveyed a new border in
accordance with the award, and both sides accepted the boundary in 1905.
The issue was considered settled for the next half-century.